TEC Strategies?

Hey, I have been playing Sins on and off for a while now. I usually have been playing singleplayer because I always get overrun in multiplayer. My way of playing the game has always been as a steamroller that is, slowly building up a fleet until it can run over everything in its path.

I am usually TEC.

Yesterday I was playing an older save, where there were five solar systems but only one really large one (The map was one of those huge maps), and I had eventually overrun every CPU in the system (I usually start out by allying myself with them then stab them in the back), but then one of the unfair CPU's came in from another star system, and pirates eventually ground my two huge fleets to dust. Now i only have 2 planets and an asteroid.

So I decided to try and modify my strategy. I have been equally building up three fleets, because usually I just make two and eventually I tend to merge them. These are small, they have a lot of repair ships, one capitol, and a lot of strike craft and kodak ships.

I am also paying more attention to planet development and I have put a lot of points into industry, however that has caused me to neglect my warfare stuff. This has allowed me to make a LOT of credits, gold, and crystal.

So do you guys have any tips and strategies I might want to employ? I have only started playing again this week.

usually as I get bigger I will take over the star system, and the star by anchoring four starbases plus a large fleet at the sun. I've found the pluses and minuses, especially when you divert the fleet.

strategy

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Given the huge size of this scenario, I'd recommend using a fleet of bombers. Against the AI, this is largely foolproof if you have enough of them (at least 50 squadrons). A large force of bombers can usually torch anything in their path, and requires some advanced tactics to counter that the AI just won't pull off. The fact that you lost to pirates indicates to me that your fleet is probably much too small. It can be tricky to balance fleet and economy, but the trick is to pinch pennies and try to get the best bang for your buck.

For economy, try to avoid too much in terms of tech. There are some good economic techs out there (Development Mandate is one of them) but more often it's expanding on your trade network that really brings in the dough. The longer your max trade route, the more money every trade port will make. This means expanding your trade route and building more trade ports can be extremely lucrative. Most of the economic techs are quite expensive, and only start to make sense once you've maxed out your trade port capacity (which is where the real money is).

If you're more than two hours into the game with a full solar system under your belt (I'm guessing it's around 30-40 planets? hard to say without seeing the solar system) you should probably have around 100-200 credits per second income after upkeep. On that kind of income, building up some superweapons, maxing out your tech, and maxing out your fleet size should be pretty easy.

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A moderate starbase or a few turrets should be enough to take care of any pirate raids... I think it's much easier to fight the pirates with static defenses, especially if you're on single-player, where the pirates have a tendency to attack the same planets - and frigates are much more fragile than combat structures.

This could be part of the problem... having three small fleets probably means that any of them could be relatively easily run over by an enemy player's main fleet, or maybe even the pirates. If you merge your ships together and keep them together you'll lose many fewer ships in whatever battles you fight.

As Darvin mentioned, a good composition is a lot of carriers/bombers (not fighters), along with a moderate number of Hoshikos and a few flak. Earlier in the game before massed carriers are a possibility, 40 or so LRM can work wonders against all but the toughest AIs.

If you want to economize, the best idea is to build as many trade ports as you can on as many planets as possible, once your fleet is big enough to fight off aggressors... after 30 minutes or so that should give you a huge income advantage, allowing you to build basically whatever you want and still win. Pervasive Economy, though expensive, can also help out a ton in those sorts of larger games.

Try relying on a fleet instead of on a starbase (or 4).

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I have never really found static defenses to be good at fighting off anyone.

I took your advice and merged two fleets, now I have 82 ships. 2 caps, 11 carriers, 3-something kodiaks, 11 repair ships, 11 cobolt, and 35 LRM. I am adding 26 more ships to this fleet now (17 carriers, 10 kodiak)

I left the third fleet to protect my planets.

And I usually have a fleet on the sun as well like I said, but four starbases with all hanger cap maxed out can do some pretty good damage if I direct them.

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depends on the static defenses you use. Pirates can only come from one place, so you have to establish a bottleneck or predictable pattern. Then you mine it like no one's business (this takes care of frigates and cruisers) and then a battle oriented starbase will be your anchor. After that, two repair bays on either side of the starbase, a hangar bay next to each for flak cover and whatever mix of hangars and gauss turrets to fill in the space. This is what I kinda remember doing. I play with a mod now that completely changes the rules, but that should be enough to knock out incoming pirates at a single point.

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Quoting Theory5,

reply 3

I have never really found static defenses to be good at fighting off anyone.

A turret (which costs about as much as 2 light frigates) does a whole lot more damage (especially against capital ships and against light frigates) and is much more durable. Against the AI, they are most certainly useful.

four starbases with all hanger cap maxed out can do some pretty good damage if I direct them.

If you like really really long games, that sort of strategy can work... but it's really a pretty significant waste of funds...

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